


Shells

by Gabri



Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Gen, I could write evil Val forever and ever, death left and right, idk what you expected from me tho apparently that's my deal, it's evil Val okay, this one's dark and violent be ready
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-02
Updated: 2015-02-02
Packaged: 2018-03-10 03:33:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3275162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gabri/pseuds/Gabri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The raids are often predictable. She's learned to combat them well. And once, every few weeks just in case she's missed the odd two or three, she combs the beach to keep it clean.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shells

**Author's Note:**

> Getting back into my writing game with a warm-up of my usual happy-go-lucky genre. I’m kidding, this is awful. Warnings for death, violence, wartime grimness. Proceed with caution pleaseeee. 
> 
> Evil!Valka. Because she’s terribly interesting to write;;;;

The raids are often predictable. She's learned to combat them well. And once, every few weeks just in case she's missed the odd two or three, she combs the beach to keep it clean.

Valka is not a cruel woman. She is not incapable of mercy, but often they do not ask for mercy. She would not seek to spread death, but often they come to her crying for war, endangering her family, and death is the only way to make them stop. Valka is not soft, but she is not heartless, and it's in protecting them that she proves she loves.

( _And she had held, once, a lover in her arms, strong and brave with a mighty heart that would defend her from any evil, but what he saw as evil Valka often saw as mute and mysterious, something to be investigated rather than needlessly killed. He never stopped loving her, even when they fought tooth and nail over their differences. And she knew this -- of course she did. But she also knew where she belonged and as much as she wanted it to be in his arms, she could only cause pain by returning._ )

Her method proves obsessive. She plans ahead before a strike, often because she knows exactly when the strike will occur. Drago's strike she has been expecting for almost a year now. It is only surprising he thinks her unprepared.

The truth is, bodies carry clues, more often than not, and Valka has disposed of her share of enemy bodies. It's arrogance that drives her human foe to attack with valuable information slipped into their pockets, assuming it will never fall to her hands, but it's consideration and not cruelty that drives her to weed their secrets from them before disposing of their empty shells.

After all, it's wasteful to throw these things out, especially when it may (and has) saved lives. Thousands of lives. _Millions_ , even, whenever the new eggs begin to hatch. And it's all worth it when she sees their growing faces, shining yellow eyes and molting scales, the tiny huffs of their childhood flames.

( _she had held, once, a child in her arms, soft and oh-so-small with eyes like his father's. And, most likely, a heart like his father's as well. Vikings were creatures of domination, even in their kindest excuse, and Valka had learned the hard way that sometimes even if you love something, someone, they are too different, too much a part of another world. And no matter how much you may dream about what could have been, no matter how much you think of their face, crying in the wake of a wound that would surely heal into a tiny scar, you have to....have to let them go._ )

The first wave is easy. Valka plucks the daggers from their belts, tosses them hard into the briny ocean.

The second wave is more of a struggle. Her Alpha takes charge as she trusts he would, but there are lives still lost. Her heart aches as she finds their weapons wet with blood, hands slippery and cold by activated traps.

The third wave she knows is the last when she combs the beach again, weary and drained, pulling helmets from the heads of what bodies look most familiar. Only hours have passed when she finds herself wrenching a helmet from his head, and confirming for herself the sharp, crooked nose, the sunken cheeks and hard brow she had only ever seen contorted in sadistic fury now slackened and lacking its severity in death.

Perhaps there were gentler ways to defend her nest, but gentle did not ensure her family's safety, and so the bodies carried away by dragon talons seem near endless in number. She's found herself combing through them with a new restlessness, tired by face after face, graying with decay and lacking in the bitter satisfaction of a nightmare defeated.

But she can't stop. She has to keep up, because the dragons don't prefer this meat, the smell is awful, and it would be wasteful, too wasteful not to spare at least a moment for what the Vikings do have to offer. She spares respect in folding their hands upon their chests, sadness in the fact that they saw fit to throw themselves to her icy knives at all, and of course, information in their tucked-away maps and rune-covered notes, places visited and weak spots discovered for her to re-seal in the spaces in-between.

Though after Drago's death, the spaces in-between come longer still.

It's not surprising; the strongest of their lot is dead. But it is not the end, either, because there are always men like Drago Bludvist, even if they span generations, even if she does not live to meet the next one. Her dragons may. And so it's important, terribly important, that she teach them how to survive, fill their good hearts with the love she has learned they alone are most deserving of.

A small fleet arrives one day, easily taken out with hardly a glance of supervision from the Dragon Queen. The clues of their culture tell a strange story; viciously painted helms, armor made of dragon hide tattered at the edges. There is bile in her throat as she imagines these men, plucking scales with careless cruelty from still-bleeding bodies. Men of great power like Drago may have fallen, but evil men will always exist. She does not mind the dragons to be gentle when their looted corpses are disposed of.

Her face is wet that night. The time for mourning was long ago, but it's only now that she thinks of the faces that will not return, the bodies of children she held in her arms, her children: brightness in their tiny, heaving scales and brightness blazing in their hearts, the only hearts she had ever really been able to understand.

Valka warms her own freezing heart with the smoky embrace of her remaining kin, with her beloved Stormcutter's sympathetic eyes, with the flasks of mead taken from the cruel and pitiful men who dared make an attempt on their lives.

There is a pulse of warning from her Alpha; an incoming invasion. Small. Valka waves her hand, watches her dragons leave to quickly take care of the threat. Her eyes, hard and hazy, find a scrap of Drago left partially disassembled. His arm. She had wanted to see how it was crafted, but mead makes her honest and she finds herself thinking, instead, how satisfying it had been to see more pieces of him ripped off.

It is another day before she combs the beach again. As expected, the bodies are few. Trappers, a tiny throng of them leftover, and one foreigner who was likely a captive to them. 

Valka picks clean the tallest of them, a muscled thing with a strong blue-marked jaw and Drago's tortured seal seared into his chest, but despite what knowledge he carries on his person, her heart lacks interest, and she finds herself too quickly moving to the next. Henchmen, stout and fresh, new to battle. They too carry the blue tattoos of this tribe. It twists her heart unexpectedly to see their astounding youth, but the pain does not last long. She has done what needed to be done. She refuses to hold the bodies of her children in her arms again. 

The captive is surely the oddest of the lot. She was right to think him prisoner now; his hands are bound, though there's no obvious sign of resistance in the knots. He lies half on his side, face turned into the earth, a pitiful thing caught between the claws of one of the larger breeds. His features, when she uncovers them at last, are long and rounded with an even more disarming youth. Valka's bare fingers skim his jaw, thoughtlessly touching the curve of his chin where the blue markings had been on the other warriors.

But there are no blue markings on this one. She finds, instead, a tiny scar.


End file.
